Walsall
04 August 2005
The filthy streets, the unwashed masses, the charming local accent that makes us sound as though we were born retarded and have been drinking turpentine every day since then… These are the best aspects of Walsall.
There’s a new art gallery, grey and shaped like a box. Clearly a great deal of thought went into making it look as appealing from the outside as it is enjoyable inside.
And a new bus station. Cost a small fortune to build, looks absolutely revolting, has slowed down traffic for miles around because the entrance is tiny and buses have to queue past the exit to get into the entrance — so a traffic jam can last theoretically until the end of time. Best of all, they didn’t realise until after it was built that it wasn’t big enough for all the buses.
The crowning glory of Walsall, though, is its people. They will happily kill you with an axe while you wait outside the local chippie for a deep-friend Mars bar. (This actually happened. An axe.)
Matt Harvey
"I do nothing and then I do something. But it's taken years of investigating idleness in all its forms to be able to achieve this. My discipline is borne out of concerted study of idleness."